From the first moment Sarah Palin walked out on stage with John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign in Dayton, Ohio, left-wing political commentators, such as John Stewart, Andrew Sullivan, and the writers at Vanity Fair and A World of Progress, have loved to hate her, and their work exposes many negative biases towards Palin. Regardless of their own stances on the issues, left wing commentators depict Palin, a former beauty pageant queen, as a flaky, flippant, trivial "hockey mom", and mock the possibility of her as a serious politician. Additionally, many liberals call Palin's ability for original thought into question and believe that her only value is as a puppet for John McCain or other more accomplished politicians. Finally, most of these left wing commentators either live or went to school in the North East and have a bias that, in general, people from areas other than the North East and some other large cities are ignorant and out of touch with reality. Therefore, many liberals try to paint a picture of Palin as a dumb, gun-slinging redneck from the glorified woods known as Alaska.
Jon Stewart (Comedy Central)
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Stewart, http://www.thedailyshow.com/)
Jon Stewart, a prominent liberal comedian and host of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central, often makes jokes at Sarah Palin's expense, and clearly has biases that Palin has no true merit due to the frivolousness of her work and speeches and her background as a "woman from the woods" (Stewart in "On Sarah") in Alaska.
Stewart often emphasizes the fact that Palin comes from Alaska. For example, on the day that John McCain announced Palin as his running mate, Stewart immediately stated that "her resume looked more suited for a Northern Exposure reunion tour" (Stewart). In 2010, when discussing a Fox news interview between Glen Beck and Sarah Palin, Stewart describes Palin as a "moose in the headlights" (Stewart in "Palin"), and later, in regards to the strategic placement of the Statue of Liberty in that same interview, Stewart points out, "she's not an immigrant, she's from Alaska" (Stewart in "On Sarah"). Stewart clearly exemplifies and plays to the bias of liberals that Alaskans, who are barely Americans, belong in the woods and can/should not be taken seriously, especially in politics.
Stewart also clearly discounts Palin's previous accomplishments and ridicules her public speaking, claiming "they just found her, and she was speaking her own language" (Stewart in "On Sarah"). He further shows his bias that she is not a serious candidate by running an entire segment in his show called "Sarah Palin is so dumb..." and by mocking her whimsical nature by saying, in reference to the Tea Party Convention, that "the only difference between this and every other Republican gathering is...of course, sass!" (Stewart in "Stewart").
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todd_Purdum)
In the August 2009 issue of Vanity Fair, Todd S. Purdum, a frequent contributor to both the New York Times and Vanity Fair wrote an expose on Sarah Palin. A fierce critic of Palin, Purdum shows signs of many frequent liberal biases towards Palin.
Setting the scene for his article, Purdum writes, "for a split second [Palin] stops, pauses, turns her head and shoulders just so, and smiles. She holds the pose until she’s sure the man has his shot and then moves on" (Purdum) and shows a liberal preference/bias to still view Palin as a flaky beauty pageant queen.
Showing his bias of the triviality of Alaska, Purdum writes, "of all the puzzling things that Sarah Palin told the American public last fall, perhaps the most puzzling was this: 'Believe me, Alaska is like a microcosm of America.' Believe me, its not" (Purdum). Moreover, Purdum calls into question the commonality of Palin claiming that the description "Alaska is a foreign country significantly populated with Americans. Its languages extend to English" (Purdum). Palin often portrays herself as one of your normal folks, but Purdum makes it clear that Alaska is neither normal nor comparable to the rest of the United States. Purdum continues by saying, "Sarah Palin herself is a microcosm of Alaska," a prime example of a politician in a "resource-rich developing country with weak institutions and woeful oversight, [where] corruption and official misconduct go easily unchecked" (Purdum).
Purdum also expresses that Palin does not have original thought, but instead merely says what she thinks she should, whether or not it makes sense or stays in line with her previous comments. Purdum writes "[Palin] can be all over the lot in the articulation of her platform" as she "sounded like a New Dealer in a June (2009) interview with Sean Hannity" but "in the next breath sounded like a 'starve the beast' conservative" (Purdum).
Purdum goes after Palin's pure lack of knowledge and experience. He questions, "how could John McCain, one of the cagiest survivors in contemporary politics... ever have picked a person whose utter shortage of qualification for her proposed job all but disqualified him for his?" (Purdum). Purdum also brings up that after Palin joined John McCain on the presidential ticket, she did not submit to any interviews for two weeks because 20 McCain staff workers were busy masking "Palin’s deep ignorance about most aspects of foreign and domestic policy" (Purdum). Here, Purdum enforces the liberal notions that Palin can't be seen as a capable candidate when her opinions are just restatements of what the McCain staff coached her to promote.
Not only does Purdum bring up Sarah Palin's ignorance to major current events, but her inability to accept instruction. John Bitney,who worked with Palin, told Purdum "it’s frustrating dealing with Sarah, because it seems we’re always dealing with emotional crap and we never seem to be able to focus on the business at hand that needs to be done. I don’t know whether to blame her or pity her for all this emotional upheaval that we’re always going through with her" (Purdum). Purdum uses this statement to portray Sarah Palin as an immature, emotional wreck "who lack[s] the knowledge, the preparation, the aptitude, and the temperament for the [vice-presidency]" (Purdum) with implications that she better fits the mold of the beauty queen turned housewife.
Andrew Sullivan (The Atlantic Monthly)
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Sullivan, http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/)
Andrew Sullivan, number 19 on Fortune's list of "The 25 Most Influential Liberals In The U.S. Media," has his own column called "Andrew Sullivan - Of No Party or Clique - The Daily Dish." On September 23, 2008, Sullivan's column held an article called "The Twelve Lies of Sarah Palin." This article lists twelve statements that Sarah Palin has told the media that were found to be less than factual. While some of the "lies" in question are truly blatant lies, most of Palin's statements are misconstrued and out of context.
Sullivan begins the piece by reiterating that Sarah Palin's statements in question "are assertions of fact that are demonstrably untrue and remain uncorrected." It is clear that Sullivan truly dislikes Sarah Palin and wants to assert as he clearly states, "the candidate for vice-president for the GOP is a compulsive, repetitive, demonstrable liar" (Sullivan, "Twelve Lies").
One of Sarah Palin's lies is that she claims she was notified of her nomination for the vice-presidency a few days before the public, while the truth was she was only notified one day before the public. Even Sullivan admits "I know this is trivial, but the point is that there is a very powerful pattern here of Sarah Palin's difficulty with telling the truth" (Sullivan). By taking this trivial lie and makes a generalization that it is proof of chronic tendencies, Sullivan exhibits his bias that Palin lacks the qualifications and behavior of a serious politician.
Sullivan's bias is clear in his description of Palin's lie about not using the teleprompter during a Republican Convention in Canton, Ohio. The lie is, as Sullivan quotes Palin, "The teleprompter got messed up, I couldn't follow it, and I just decided I'd just talk to the people in front of me" (Palin in Sullivan), which the McCain-Palin campaign spokesperson, Tucker Bounds, said meant that at times she had to ad-lib when she couldn't follow the projector. According to Sullivan, "some conservative blogger reported that sources close to McCain had told them that the teleprompter had broken and Palin "winged it" (Sullivan). This "conservative blogger" is an unnamed blogger who got his information that the teleprompter broke from another unnamed person, who claims to be close to McCain-Palin. However, Sullivan's bias is so deep rooted that when comparing the two statements side-by-side, Sullivan trusted the internet blog over a press statement directly from the McCain-Palin campaign.
Going through the list, Sullivan makes jeering statements like "This was another odd lie - easily disproven" (Sullivan) and "defend that one. C'mon: defend it" (Sullivan). While a few of the "lies" held bearing and were supported, most are supported by a juxtaposition of ambiguous and out-of-context quotes that can only be seen as proof when seen from a very biased point of view. Yet Sullivan feels confident enough to say, "the pattern of [Palin's] outright and constant deception is now unmissable" (Sullivan) and Americans "cannot trust a word [Palin] says. On anything" (Sullivan). Sullivan's strong dislike of Palin makes the idea that he is "Of No Party or Clique" seem like a lie of his own.
Nunzia Rider (A World of Progress)
(See: http://aworldofprogress.com/) A World of Progress, the self proclaimed "online magazine for the Progressive human" is a popular leftist publication. One of their writers, Nunzia Rider, often comments on politics and recently wrote an article titled "Why I hate Sarah Palin". Needless to say, Rider, who claims Palin "represents the worst in Americans" (Rider) pulls no punches in expressing her distaste of Sarah Palin, and in doing so exposes many of her liberal biases towards Palin.
Rider uses Palin's seemingly varying and hypocritical expressions of her stance on climate change to illustrate what Palin "represents -- the willfully ignorant, the sheeple, those who believe what they're told without any thought of their own" (Rider, "Why"). This accusation stays in line with the biased view of Palin as an inexperienced, sheep-like puppet who's just along for the ride, and cannot be taken seriously on her own. Rider even goes so far as to say "[Palin's] just a pawn, like every other woman on the conservative side" (Rider, "Why").
Additionally, the author claims that Palin tells herself that "[liberals] think too much" (Rider, "Why"), with the clear implication that Palin devalues intelligent thought. Furthermore, Rider sarcastically criticizes Palin's lax style of speech claiming that due to Twitter, Palin "now has a legitimate reason to ignore spelling, grammar and sentence structure" (Rider, "Why"). Many liberals refuse to take Palin seriously due to her folksy language (Glynnis MacNicol compares her language skills "to that of a toddler") and the seeming frivolity of many of her statements. As Rider wrote in another article, "The Joke's On You", "Tina Fey was spot on as Sarah Palin because she said stuff like 'I can see Russia from my house'" (Rider, "Joke's"). Saturday Night Live originally wrote this line for the comedic value, but as Rider shows, many liberals see this as an accurate representation of Palin.
(Jeremy & Dan)
The "Left" on Sarah Palin
From the first moment Sarah Palin walked out on stage with John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign in Dayton, Ohio, left-wing political commentators, such as John Stewart, Andrew Sullivan, and the writers at Vanity Fair and A World of Progress, have loved to hate her, and their work exposes many negative biases towards Palin. Regardless of their own stances on the issues, left wing commentators depict Palin, a former beauty pageant queen,Jon Stewart (Comedy Central)
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Stewart, http://www.thedailyshow.com/)Jon Stewart, a prominent liberal comedian and host of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central, often makes jokes at Sarah Palin's expense, and clearly has biases that Palin has no true merit due to the frivolousness of her work and speeches and her background as a "woman from the woods" (Stewart in "On Sarah") in Alaska.
Jon Stewart on Palin -
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/fri-august-29-2008/john-mccain-chooses-a-running-matehttp://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-november-6-2008/sarah-palin-is-so-dumb---
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-november-24-2008/the-daily-show-s-best-sarah-palin-moments
Todd S. Purdum (Vanity Fair)
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todd_Purdum)In the August 2009 issue of Vanity Fair, Todd S. Purdum, a frequent contributor to both the New York Times and Vanity Fair wrote an expose on Sarah Palin. A fierce critic of Palin, Purdum shows signs of many frequent liberal biases towards Palin.
Andrew Sullivan (The Atlantic Monthly)
(See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Sullivan, http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/)Andrew Sullivan, number 19 on Fortune's list of "The 25 Most Influential Liberals In The U.S. Media," has his own column called "Andrew Sullivan - Of No Party or Clique - The Daily Dish." On September 23, 2008, Sullivan's column held an article called "The Twelve Lies of Sarah Palin." This article lists twelve statements that Sarah Palin has told the media that were found to be less than factual. While some of the "lies" in question are truly blatant lies, most of Palin's statements are misconstrued and out of context.
Nunzia Rider (A World of Progress)
(See: http://aworldofprogress.com/)A World of Progress, the self proclaimed "online magazine for the Progressive human" is a popular leftist publication. One of their writers, Nunzia Rider, often comments on politics and recently wrote an article titled "Why I hate Sarah Palin". Needless to say, Rider, who claims Palin "represents the worst in Americans" (Rider) pulls no punches in expressing her distaste of Sarah Palin, and in doing so exposes many of her liberal biases towards Palin.
Leftist Cartoons of Sarah Palin -
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/php/galleries/gallery.php/palin-political-cartoons/15/32/32.html
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/php/galleries/gallery.php/palin-political-cartoons/15/24/24.html
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/blogs/commcomm/media/palin-horsey-09032008.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_E8BpJEni77I/SjemiYAuqpI/AAAAAAAAJgI/cr-dn01TNXI/s400/sarah_palin_joke_tshirt-p235451500103542361trls_400.jpg
Works Referenced